On this date in 1977 Derby was awarded city status. 10 things you didn’t know about Derby:
Derby was first settled by the Romans, who called the town Derventio. It was captured by the Anglo-Saxons, and then by the Vikings, who called it Djúra-bý and made it one of the Five Boroughs of the Danelaw.
The meaning of Djúra-bý is disputed. Some say it means "Village of the Deer" while others say the name is linked to the river Derwent, which flows through it. Derby could therefore be a shortened version of Derwent by, which means "Derwent settlement". The name "Derwent" means "a valley thick with oaks".
Derby was home to the world’s first factory, a silk throwing mill, built by Thomas Lombe in 1721 on an island on the River Derwent. To celebrate its 300th anniversary, the factory was restored and opened to the public in 2021 as the Museum of Making at Derby Silk Mill.
Derby Arboretum is England’s first public park. The land was donated by businessman and philanthropist, Joseph Strutt and John Claudius Loudon, a Scottish botanist, designed it. The park opened to the public in 1840. The park’s other claim to fame is that Frederick Law Olmstead visited in 1859 and incorporated some of the features into his design for Central Park in New York.
Derby Cathedral tower is 212 feet (68.6 meters) tall, making it the second highest perpendicular church tower in England. Since 2006 a pair of breeding peregrine falcons have made the tower their home, and can be observed via a webcam.
The bells of the cathedral are the oldest set of 10 bells in the world. One of them was cast in 1520 during the reign of Henry VIII, and is still in use.
The city’s emblem is the Derby Ram. There’s a folk song about it, and it provides the nickname for the local Football team, Derby County F.C.
The Derby Wireless Club was formed in 1911 and was the first Radio or 'wireless club' in the country.
The computer game character Lara Croft was created here, at Derby-based game studio Core Design. There’s even a street named after her. Lara Croft Way was a name chosen by public vote when a new traffic system was created in 2010.
Osnabrück in Germany and Hebron in Palestine are among Derby’s sister cities.
New!!!
The six richest people in Britain decide to hold a contest to settle the question of which of them is most successful. It will be a gladiator style contest with each entrant fielding a team of ten super-powered combatants. Entrepreneur Llew Powell sets out to put together his team, which includes his former lover, an employee of his company with a fascinating hobby, two refugees from another dimension (a lonely giant and a drunken sailor), two sisters bound together by a promise, a diminutive doctor, a former Tibetan monk initiate and two androids with a history. As the team train together, alliances form, friendships and more develop, while others find the past is not easy to leave behind.
Meanwhile, a ruthless race of aliens has its eyes on the Earth. Already abducting and enslaving humans, they work towards the final invasion which would destroy life on Earth as we know it. Powell’s group, Combat Team Alpha, stumble upon one of the wormholes the aliens use to travel to Earth and witness for themselves the horrors in store if the aliens aren’t stopped. Barely escaping with their lives, they realise there are more important things to worry about than a fighting competition.
No comments:
Post a Comment